The Chances to Take
by Yuisaki
Summary: The war has gone for six years but at the end of it, no one is alive to witness the destruction it has left behind except for Allen. But one deal with the Heart changes it all, and he suddenly finds himself back with another chance to change the past. The only setback - the fact that he's apparently nine, and stranded in the Asian Branch with no one but lunatics for company. Great.


**Title:** The Chances to Take

**Author:** Yuisaki

**Rating: **T

**Summary: **The war has gone for six years but at the end of it, no one is alive to witness the destruction it has left behind except for Allen. But one deal with the Heart changes it all, and he suddenly finds himself back with another chance to change the past. The only setback - the fact that he's apparently nine, and stranded in the Asian Branch with no one but lunatics for company. Great.

**General warnings:** AU, violence, swearing, time travel fic, GEN, Half-Noah!Allen, spoilers for chapter 218.

**A/N: **The story takes place after 218, but Allen eventually comes back to fight with the Order. Six years pass and the war finally ends but no one's alive. Sorry. Neah and Allen are also cooperating with each other even though that's practically impossible, but it'll be explained later. By the way, this fic is GEN, meaning _no pairings. None. _So please don't ask me to add Yullen or Laven or Allen x Lenalee or any other pairing. There will be no pairings, but there will be a lot of feels so you're free to interpret it that way if you like. It just won't be what I imagined. Okay, so enjoy the story.

* * *

**Prologue.**

Nothing left.

Allen exhaled shakily, breath shuddering as he closed his silvery-gray eyes from the world.

Snow drifted slowly to the frozen ground, blanketing the barren battlefield with white silence. Only the muted sounds of the icy wind blowing broke it, and Allen watched as his breath rose in the air, puffs of foggy mist that soon disappeared as well.

Cold water began seeping through his ragged clothes, and his breath grew shallow, rattling uncertainly in his lungs. The snow snuck its way into his bones, slowly leeching what warmth he had from him, and Allen -

Allen honestly couldn't bring himself to care. Cold or warm, it no longer mattered because it simply _didn't_. There was no one left to berate him on this quiet night, nothing holding him back as his skin became colder and colder. The ground had begun to dye itself a gruesome red when he thought, _What does it matter if I die?_

_Friends,_ said a voice weakly in his mind. _What about your friends, Allen?_

Allen scoffed. _Tell me, do you see any of them here? Because they're already gone, and I just can't reach them anymore._

_Allen…_

_None of it matters, Neah,_ Allen said tiredly. _I've fought and I've fought, but it doesn't matter anymore. All of them are dead, and we're the last ones to go. All that's left is to finish the job and then there'll be no one to tell this wretched tale of war. And that's the best way, the way it should be._

_Allen, you have to keep trying, _said Neah desperately._ You have to keep walking. Isn't that what you promised Mana? What you promised me?_

_The path ends here,_ said Allen. _There's no place left that I can walk to. It's gone._

_Pick a new one, then,_ Neah said. _That's all you have to do._

_Pick a new path doing what?_ Allen asked. _What else is there that I have to do?_

_Not have to, said_ Neah. _Want to._

_This was what I wanted to do, Neah. I just had nothing to fall back on, and now I'm here, dying in battlefield full of bodies with a hole in my chest. My reason for living was always for the demons and the humans, to keep walking for Mana. You know that. But I don't have that anymore. Everything ended here, today on this battlefield, and our promise was fulfilled. So what else do you want me to do?_

There was no answer. Allen's head fell back against the dirt.

Pain suddenly lanced through his chest, and he doubled up on the ground, clutching at his side as the movement jarred his broken bones. Blood soon made its way onto the white snow, and Allen gasped air in with trembling breaths, rolling over onto his back with effort. He let out a soft groan, breaths becoming quieter with every second that passed.

Tiredly, he opened his eyes and searched for the familiar rich green that he had come to associate with his friend. His eyebrows furrowed when he couldn't spot her, and through a hazed vision, he called out, "Hey, Lenalee, do you think you can -"

_"Allen-kun, watch out!"_

Allen stopped himself after the first couple of words.

Right.

Lenalee wasn't there anymore.

There was nothing left, no one left besides him.

He was the last one.

"Damn." His vision blurred, and then there were hot tears streaming down his icy cheeks. Long hair, bright rooms, a place that they could call 'Home', laughter, warmth, _happiness…_

_Lenalee, Yu, Lavi, everyone..._

Gone.

Every single last one of them - gone.

Chest shuddering with silent sobs, he pounded his fist weakly against the dirt. His teeth bit down on his lips until the metallic taste of blood filled his mouth, and tears disappeared into the white snow again and again. But it didn't matter. None of it did.

All he cared about was the fact that Lenalee's beautiful green hair was spilled on the ground, soaked with blood and burned at the edges like the rest of her body; that Yu's sword was lying in shattered pieces by his side, no longer gleaming dangerously as it once had; that Lavi's headband was somewhere far away, torn and matted with dirt where they had been forced to leave it with his corpse.

"Damn it all."

And with silent tears falling, Allen gritted his teeth and beat his fist against the ground once more.

_Oh, God,_ Allen whispered, and his shoulders trembled. _I want to see them so badly again, Neah. I want to see them alive and happy like they used to be before this damn war destroyed everything._

_Me too, _said Neah. He was unusually quiet and subdued as Allen's gaze fell on a pair of vacant eyes. His own eyes were falling shut when Neah said,_ I want to go back too, Allen._

Gold suddenly flashed in the corner of his vision and his mind wandered away from the conversation in a quickly vanishing hope. "Timcanpy?" Allen called, unable to stop the words from escaping. "Timcanpy, is that -"

But it wasn't his precious golden golem that had stuck by him faithfully for years. No, Timcanpy had died a long time ago when he was sixteen.

It was a gleaming gold button from a Dark Order coat, no doubt something dropped by Tyki Mikk. Straining his eyes, Allen read the name on the button to himself. _Froi Tiedoll,_ it said in neat, hand-written font.

He always thought that Johnny with his large glasses and cramped hands would order the buttons and leave them blank. Though no, it was all hand-made including the buttons, and the idea that Johnny would actually write the names in himself never occurred to Allen.

But it did make sense. Johnny had died by stubbornly sticking by his side, even after he told the other man that the Noah, akuma, and the Earl himself would be chasing them, and would do so until Allen was caught. Even after all that, he had stayed, insisting adamantly with clenched fists and angry eyes, _"Allen needs a friend who believes in him, and I'll be that friend no matter what!"_

Allen breathed out a puff of laughter. God, that man had been _angry_ at him for even suggesting that he should be alone. Angry at Allen even as the bruises inflicted by Neah taking over Allen's body stood out clearly on his cheek, angry at the face of Allen's claw-tipped fingers poised at his throat, angry even though his body had been trembling with fear that he couldn't stamp out completely. That man couldn't bump into someone without apologizing or get to the end of a street of beggars without growing broke himself, and yet Johnny had been angry at Allen.

A ridiculously brave and loyal man that Allen hadn't known he needed to be his friend until after Johnny was gone.

And Froi Tiedoll too had been the same. He had joined the ranks of the Allen's quickly growing Army of Surrogate Fathers and stayed, ever since he had knocked Yu unconscious for days to stop him from charging into the front lines in a sudden fit of anger. Yu had been nearly uncontrollable at the time, and the way that Froi had calmly walked over and chopped him sharply in the back of the neck still brought a smile to Allen's lips now.

But of course, that man was dead too, had been for hours with the rest of their comrades.

His eyes slowly slid shut. Mind fading away, his awareness crumbled into nothing as he sank deeper into the darkness.

If only he could have another chance.

_As if. The world's not fair like that._

The faintest of smiles appeared unbidden on the corner of his lips. Either way, he would see them again, and that was good enough._ Yu, Lenalee, Lavi, Krory, Bookman, Miranda, Marie, Cross, Johnny..._

_Everyone, I'll be there soon._


End file.
